


Chimney

by shieldivarius



Series: Femslash Yuletide 2014 [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/F, Femslash Yuletide, Mission Fic, Prompt: Chimney
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-03
Updated: 2014-12-03
Packaged: 2018-02-28 02:21:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2715401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shieldivarius/pseuds/shieldivarius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Their suspect could actually travel up and down chimneys. Like the actual Santa Claus.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chimney

**Author's Note:**

> All of the Melinda/Natasha stories in this year's Femslash Yuletide are in the same universe and chronological unless stated otherwise!

“Nutter thinks he’s Santa Claus.”

Suburbia. Wealthy, low density, suburbia celebrating Christmas being three weeks’ away with its halls fully decked. All the lights on, every house glowing in the early darkness, and not a sole home for a 10-mile radius thanks to a S.H.I.E.L.D.-ordered evacuation.

Natasha, with Barton next to her, crouched on a snowy rooftop, adjacent to the one their suspect was on. Barton had an arrow nocked, was pointing it at the freak they’d been chasing rooftop-to-rooftop (why did developers insist on cramming houses in so close together?) for the past hour. Every time they thought they’d cornered him, pinned him to a rooftop far enough away from the next one to catch up, he’d slide down the chimney.

Which was, Natasha had finally admitted to herself, somehow not impossible.

 _“He’s doing it again,”_ buzzed Melinda’s voice in her ear. She was on aerial watch, stationed in the chopper overhead. _“Take him down, Hawkeye.”_

“What, you don’t want to see how he does it?” Clint asked. Natasha elbowed him. His shit-eating grin didn’t disappear even as he loosed the arrow…

…And it flew clear through where Santa had been standing a moment before.

“Did you catch that?” Natasha demanded.

 _“Running playback now,”_ Melinda said. Then, _“He’s wearing something around his waist. Presses a button; jumps down the chimney; disappears.”_

“You’re shitting me.”

_“Wish I was.”_

“This is fucked.”

“Focus, Hawkeye,” Natasha snapped. “Cover the front door. I’ve got the back.”

She leapt across to the rooftop their suspect had disappeared from and rappelled down into the backyard. 

The sliding glass doors were locked, the foot-deep snow covering the lawn and patio untouched except for Natasha’s own footprints. 

_“Anything?”_ Barton asked.

“No,” she replied. Not even a sign of him moving around inside the house when she pressed her face to the door and peered inside. 

_“Not here either. What’s he doing, taking a shit?”_

_“He’s back on the roof, it works both ways,”_ Melinda said, urgency in her voice. _“Get back up there,_ now. _”_

With a wild look upward at the eaves above, Natasha tugged on her rappel line and shot back skyward. She could hear their Santa taking off even as she clamoured back over the edge of the roof, heard the _thump_ of him landing on the next house over. Above, Melinda spun the chopper around so the huge floodlight shining down from it lit up their suspect as he took off, for what good that had done since they’d lost the sun half an hour ago.

“I’m taking him down,” Natasha said, leaping to the next rooftop and hearing Barton scrambling behind her. She raised her gun, sighted and fired before anyone could issue orders to the contrary.

Santa went down with a bullet in his leg mid-step, just as he was grasping the cover on the next chimney.

 

“I’m sorry you got dragged out into that,” Natasha said to a very, very quiet Melinda later that night. Three o’clock in the morning and they were just getting in from debrief. 

Melinda made a noise and took a sip of tea. Then, staring into her mug as she spoke, said, “It was well within my contract.”

Natasha lifted a shoulder, barely a shrug. “A contract you were pushed into.”

That brought Melinda’s gaze up, but the look in them was pointed, chiding and targeted. A poor choice of words on Natasha’s part, perhaps. “I’m fine with the terms.”

Silence lapsed between them, the glow from the Christmas tree in the corner softening the stillness on Melinda’s face. Natasha studied her carefully after Melinda looked own again, it feeling too much like Melinda was avoiding her gaze.

“Well,” Natasha said, and stretched out in her chair. “After tonight, I’m glad neither of us has a fireplace.”

The corner of Melinda’s lips twitched and she glanced up, but she didn’t smile.

**Author's Note:**

> http://shieldivarius.tumblr.com


End file.
